Cornhole, competitive dancing, lightsaber fighting and other fringe sports

With spring training underway for Major League Baseball – 150 years after the start of the National League – it’s fun to look at some fringe sports that hope someday to become mainstream and have staying power. Good luck with that.

International Dance League

The International Dance League on March 4 announced the launch of its first official competitive season, marking a major milestone in the league’s mission to establish dance as a professional, global sport.
“IDL’s first season will feature six of the most influential and accomplished professional dance teams in the world, competing across six scheduled regular-season events in New York (USA), Vancouver (Canada), Sydney (Australia), Seoul (South Korea), and two in Los Angeles (USA),” IDL said in a news release. “Each event will have standardized judging and a championship title modeled after traditional professional sports leagues, with a season champion crowned at the end.”
The first event is set for May 2 in New York City. The championship will be held in Los Angeles on Sept. 20.
“Fans can expect high-level athletic performances, cultural expression, and live entertainment, catering to both in-person audiences and global digital viewership,” IDL said.

Saber Legion World Championships

The competitive world of LED lightsaber combat is the subject of a new documentary called “Saber.” It focuses on a group of dedicated saber combat athletes – and likely “Star Wars” fanatics – as they prepare for the Saber Legion World Championships in Las Vegas, according to GeekTyrant.

Ultimate Fighting Bots

Ultimate Fighting Bots is the world’s first humanoid robot combat league where humans pilot robots in real-time battles. The most recent event was held Jan. 6 in Las Vegas at the Battlebots Arena. I’ll be more interested when the robots are autonomous.

World Chase Tag

World Chase Tag is the first and only global league for competitive tag. Born from a backyard game in 2011, WCT now attracts athletes from 18 nations across two divisions: an open division and a dedicated women’s division.
Two teams of up to 6 athletes face off inside The Quad, a 12-meter by 12-meter arena filled with obstacles, adding a parkour element to the game. Each match is best of 16 chases. If the evader survives 20 seconds without being tagged, their team scores. If a match is tied, it goes to Sudden Death Chase-Off. Each team picks their best chaser and best evader for one final chase each.

World Axe Throwing League

The World Axe Throwing League has taken the recreational activity of axe throwing and turned it into a competitive sport.
The World Axe Throwing League has brought together axe-throwing clubs and standardized the sport with official league rules and safety protocols.

American Cornhole League

The American Cornhole League is attempting to turn the casual backyard bag-tossing game into a pro sport. These tossers take this game seriously.

Major League Wiffle Ball

Major League Wiffle Ball, aka MLW, is a professional wiffleball league, established in 2009. MLW currently features an eight-team league based out of Brighton, Michigan. It also sponsors a tournament circuit. It has hosted tournaments in Michigan, Ohio, New York, Massachusetts, Illinois, Texas, and Arizona.

USA Pickleball National Championships

The leisure activity of pickleball has gone big time with the USA Pickleball National Championships. The next championships will be held at the Barnes Tennis Center in San Diego, Calif., from Oct. 31 through Nov. 8.

Pillow Fight Championship

The Pillow Fight Championship is a professional sports organization that arranges competitive pillow fighting matches. It was founded in 2021 and offers a unique style of combat sport using specialized pillows, according to Wikipedia.

Enhanced Games

The upcoming Enhanced Games will feature athletes who are allowed to take performance-enhancing drugs banned in other sports. The May 24 event in Las Vegas will feature 50 athletes competing in swimming, weightlifting and track and field.
(See articles by ESPN and the Guardian.)

Related articles:

Blood sports satisfy primal male urges for violence (Tech-media-tainment; March 7, 2026)

ESPN’s ‘The Ocho’ Is Back, but Is Axe Throwing a Sport? We Asked. (Morning Consult; Aug. 6, 2019)

Strange sports: Lingerie MMA, pizza acrobatics, lumberjack contests (Tech-media-tainment; Sept. 23, 2017)

Photos from their respective sports organizations.

Blood sports satisfy primal male urges for violence

Some sports fans like to see athletes spill blood or suffer concussions and broken bones. That’s the only way to explain some emerging violent sports. We already have boxing and mixed martial arts, but apparently they aren’t extreme enough for some fans.
What follows is a look at some alternative brutal sports.

Run Nation Championship

Run Nation Championship is a highly controversial Australian full-contact sport where two athletes sprint at full speed and collide with each other like modern-day jousting. The object is to knock your opponent down or out cold. Critics say the new sport is reckless, dangerous and should be banned. It debuted in early 2026. SB Nation said the sport is dumber than Power Slap.
(See articles by Vice, Complex, Daily Mail and MMA Mania.)

Power Slap

Power Slap is a U.S. slap-fighting competition. Athletes stand face to face and slap each other as hard as they can. That’s pretty much it. The first event was held in 2023.

Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship

Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship is the first legal, sanctioned, and regulated bare-knuckle boxing event in the U.S. since 1889. Based in Philadelphia, BKFC says it is dedicated to preserving the historical legacy of bare-knuckle fighting. Its first event was held in 2018.

Photos from their respective organizations.

My 2026 picks for the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame

The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Foundation on Feb. 25 announced a list of 17 performer nominees to be considered for 2026 induction into the Rock Hall. And fan voting is now open.
Fans can choose up to seven artists for the eventual fan ballot. And like Chicago politics, people should vote early and vote often. But a warning: the voting website was down when I tried it today.
The inductees will be announced in late April.
Here are my seven picks for induction this year:

• Phil Collins
• INXS
• Joy Division + New Order
• Billy Idol
• Mariah Carey
• Melissa Etheridge
• Iron Maiden

Some thoughts on my picks:
Phil Collins is currently leading the fan voting by a wide margin and for good reason. The beloved music icon has a fantastic solo catalog and deserves to be a double inductee like his Genesis bandmate Peter Gabriel. Shockingly, he's a first-time nominee this year. In fact, 10 of the 17 nominees are first-timers.
In my Jan. 27 blog post, I urged the Rock Hall to get back to basics and choose some true rockers this year. In that spirit, I am backing rockers Billy Idol, INXS, Iron Maiden and Melissa Etheridge.
I also hope this finally will be the year New Order (and its predecessor Joy Division) gets in. They're an amazingly influential electronic band with great music.
And finally, there's Mariah Carey. She's an extraordinarily successful pop singer and a legendary diva. She needs to get in the Rock Hall before fellow nominees and female singers Pink, Sade, Shakira and Lauryn Hill.

The Winter Olympics and fringe sports

The Winter Olympics are underway in Italy and with it the return of some fringe sports that most people only hear about every four years. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. But I find fringe sports interesting.
The Milan Cortina 2026 Olympic Winter Games run from Feb. 6 through 22. They will feature such popular sports as alpine skiing, cross-country skiing, figure skating, speed skating and ice hockey.
This year’s Winter Olympics added its first new sport in over two decades – ski mountaineering, aka “skimo.” The last one added was skeleton in 2002. (See articles by NPR and Sherwood News.)
All told, the 2026 Winter Olympics in Italy will feature 116 medal events across 16 different sports and disciplines.
Some seem like fringe sports that should be eliminated from the games but probably won’t for historical and other reasons. Chief among them is curling. Come on, that’s not a sport. It’s a pastime for people in the northern climes.
I also don’t get the appeal of bobsleigh, which comes in two-man and four-man varieties as well as two-woman and women’s monobob.
While luge is a legitimate sport in my mind, I don’t understand the reasoning behind doubles, which stacks a second person on the sled. It has been relentlessly ridiculed in memes this year, for good reason.

Photo: Luge women’s doubles at Winter Olympics 2026. (Olympics photo)

How do you find out you’re good at this? What’s the conversation look like https://t.co/3ZuH3NDVPV pic.twitter.com/4mYOoaEGhg

— National Champion Speaker (@HoosierSpeaker) February 11, 2026

Winter Olympics Introduces Exciting New Event 'Septuple Luge' https://t.co/Eo8Ou5o1hO pic.twitter.com/eu8uTPnWUQ

— The Babylon Bee (@TheBabylonBee) February 11, 2026

El deporte es tan homoerótico en tantos aspectos. los amé pic.twitter.com/lX206BwrWH

— JONATHAN (@_macaconinja_) February 11, 2026

Newspapers I used to work for and what’s become of them

My professional career has been in two parts. The first was after I earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, and worked for daily newspapers. The second was after I earned a master’s degree in journalism from Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, and then worked for trade and business media.
I don’t include the first part of my career on my LinkedIn profile. It was fun, educational and helped hone my stills in reporting, writing and editing, but it really doesn’t pertain to my current focus.
But lately I’ve been thinking about those print media days. I still have boxes of “clips” of articles from those years. I’ll probably just end up throwing them away at some point.
What spurred my nostalgia was recent headlines. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution just stopped printing a paper newspaper after 157 years and the Washington Post is slashing its staff amid a shrinking business.
It’s a tough time for print journalism after decades of business erosion due to the internet.
As an undergraduate student at U of I in the early 1980s, I worked at the Daily Illini student newspaper, which then published five days a week. Apparently it now only prints a weekly edition, called The DI, on Wednesday and is mostly focused on online news, which makes sense.
After college, I worked for the Small Newspaper Group, owned by the Small family out of Kankakee, Ill. I started at the Streator Times-Press in central Illinois. I worked there for two years (1984-86) before moving to the Daily Dispatch in Moline, Ill., and shortly thereafter the Rock Island Argus.
The Streator newspaper merged with its bigger sister newspaper in Ottawa, Ill., to serve the greater LaSalle County, Illinois, area, in September 2005.
In March 2018, Shaw Media bought the combined newspaper. (See articles by the AP, Streator Chamber of Commerce, and Dirks, Van Essen & Murray.)
I have fond memories of working in Streator, an industrial and farming community. One large factory there made glass bottles. There was a bar across the street for workers that I would go to. The bartenders would pour beer from bottles, which they would toss in a chute on the wall behind them. The bottles would smash as they fell into a container on the other side, presumably to be recycled to make new beer bottles.
When I moved to the Quad Cities to work for the Daily Dispatch and Rock Island Argus (1986-92), I lived in East Moline, Ill.
An industrial Midwest hub located on the Mississippi River dividing Illinois and Iowa, the Quad Cities are made up of Davenport and Bettendorf, Iowa, and Moline and Rock Island, Illinois. There are lots of great parks and restaurants there and it is home to agriculture giant John Deere.
The two sister newspapers eventually merged operations. And in June 2017, Lee Enterprises, publisher of the rival Quad-City Times in Davenport, bought out its cross-river competition from the Small family. (See articles by Our QC News, the Quad-City Times, KWQC and Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.)

Photos: My profile of Jim’s Rib Haven from the April 28, 1991, edition of the Rock Island Argus. I was saddened to hear that Jim’s Rib Haven has since closed.

Note to Rock Hall: Get back to basics

With the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame preparing nominations for this year’s induction ceremony, it is important that the body pick an exciting, back-to-basics slate of candidates.
I won’t quarrel with the hall’s recent choices, but I wish they rocked a little harder.
Next year will mark the 75th anniversary of what’s considered the first major rock concert, the Moondog Coronation Ball. It was held in Cleveland, Ohio, on March 21, 1952.
So, the voters should keep that milestone event in mind when picking acts from their embarrassingly large backlog of artists.
Rockers who have been previously nominated but not inducted include Billy Idol, Iron Maiden, Motörhead, Steppenwolf and Thin Lizzy.
Some other rockers I’d like to see nominated include INXS, No Doubt, Phil Collins, Scorpions and Smashing Pumpkins.
Other people have suggested Boston, Mötley Crüe, Melissa Etheridge, Styx and REO Speedwagon.
Come on, Rock Hall, focus more on rock music this year.

Photo: No Doubt promotional art for their residency at the Las Vegas Sphere.

Music residencies make Las Vegas an entertainment destination

For older, established music artists, there’s no need to tour when fans can come to you. That’s the point behind music residencies in Las Vegas, which has become more a destination for entertainment and sports than gambling.
Earlier this month, I saw Jennifer Lopez perform at the Colosseum at Caesars Palace as part of her “Up All Night” residency. JLo put on a great show, singing and dancing to her pop hits and Broadway classics.
The Colosseum has hosted residencies for Adele, Celine Dion, Elton John and more. Aside from JLo, other current and upcoming residencies include Blake Shelton, Def Leppard, Cyndi Lauper, Rod Stewart and Kelly Clarkson.
Another site of Las Vegas residencies is the iconic Sphere arena. It’s hosted U2, the Eagles, Backstreet Boys and Phish. Upcoming shows include No Doubt and Kenny Chesney.
The Dolby Live theater at Park MGM has hosted residencies for Bruno Mars, Janet Jackson, Usher, Maroon 5 and Mariah Carey. Current and upcoming residencies include Zayn Malik and Mary J. Blige.
The Venetian Theatre has featured residencies by Foreigner and The B-52s. Current and upcoming residences include Styx, Collective Soul and Chicago.
Entertainment has become more important to Las Vegas as casino gambling has spread across the U.S. In the past, casinos were only legal in Nevada and New Jersey.
Sports is another tourist draw with the opening in July 2020 of Allegiant Stadium, home of the Las Vegas Raiders NFL football team.
Plus, the former Oakland Athletics are building a baseball stadium on the Las Vegas Strip. That ballpark for the Las Vegas A’s is due to open spring 2028.
There’s also the T-Mobile Arena, which hosts the Vegas Golden Knights NHL hockey team as well as Ultimate Fighting Championship matches, concerts and other events.

Related articles:

The top 5 greatest Las Vegas residencies of all time (TheStreet; Jan. 9, 2026)

Photo: Promotional photo for Jennifer Lopez residency at the Colosseum at Caesars Palace.

Jennifer Lopez’s Up All Night Live Las Vegas Residency Setlist: Every Song From Night 1 https://t.co/dnyc0VZtmD via @billboard

— Patrick Seitz (@PatrickSeitz) January 1, 2026

Great show Saturday night by the incomparable Jennifer Lopez. Packed crowd for JLo’s residency at Caesar’s. @JLo @CaesarsPalace pic.twitter.com/bd9R7exm5m

— Patrick Seitz (@PatrickSeitz) January 4, 2026